Man Boobs for Boobs

WATCH OF THE WEEK

Between the Rachel Roy/Beyonce Lemonade controversy and the viral “#MoreThanMean” video, there has been a lot of attention on online bullying this week, making The Guardian’s recent web-piece, “The Dark Side of Guardian Comments,” even more of a must see. The story is peppered with videos of first person of accounts of three writers, Jessica Valenti, Steven Thrasher and Nesrine Malik, exploring how abusive comments are negatively impacting journalism. Their testimonies are accompanied by the publication's research into the frequency of abusive comments as well as who is most likely to receive them and finishes up with a quiz for readers to try their hand at comment moderation. Anyone who’s read a comment section before knows how mean it can get but we bet you didn’t expect it to be this personal.

MARKETING BUZZ

We’ve been saying it for a while now that users are craving multi-sensory engagement and VR is a great way to do just that. So far, we’ve seen VR technology incorporated into video games, music, art and fashion and now it’s coming to the food scene. Marshmallow Laser Feast, the London based design studio behind the Musical Laser Forest, recently announced an upcoming collaboration with Michelin star chef, Heston Blumenthal, to create a completely immersive VR enhanced dining experience. Although many of the details are remain hush hush, we do know that it will include puppeteers, real time motion capture technology and sound design. How do we make a reservation?

OUR OBSESSION

This week, we here at Trendera fell in love with the independently-produced television series The JAMZ, a workplace comedy set at a fictional Chicago radio station. A few of the stars of the show include Kathy Najimy and David Pasquesi-both of whom you might recognize from HBO’s hit show VEEP. The JAMZ is the first independently produced series from The Orchard and NYTVF Productions-the production arm of the New York Television Festival. Previously only available on iTunes, the hit is making its way to Netflix and subscribers worldwide on April 30th. We know what we will be doing this weekend!

IN OUR CARTS

With summer just around the corner, those without central air conditioning are no doubt thinking about how to keep their living spaces cool. Enter Noria, the first smart window air conditioning unit. With its sleek design and easy to use interface and accompanying app, it's poised to be a huge hit with tech hungry audiences. Plus, it's the perfect option for Millennials who crave a smart house but don't want commit themselves to anything more than a one year apartment lease. After just a week on Kickstarter, Noria has already shattered it’s $250k goal and we can’t wait to see just how much funding they rack up when it’s all said and done.

APP-TASTIC

The latest apps to come out of the sharing economy facilitate courier services between travelers and people looking to procure or transport certain items rather than pay for shipping. Two such apps are Airmule and Grabr. Airmule connects travelers—dubbed “mules”—with extra luggage space to people looking to ship their items domestically or internationally. Grabr is similar in that it also acts as a facilitator of courier services but positions itself more as a store for hard-to-find or location-specific goods. Unlike Airmule, Grabr allows users to set their own rates for what they would be willing to pay to have something delivered to them. Word of advice to transporters: make sure to inspect your goods before going through airport security.

PROPS TO

By now, you’re familiar with the #FreeTheNipple movement protesting the ban of female nipples on social platforms like Facebook and Instagram. Gender equality aside, some have found that this is also detrimental to women’s health in that it prevents the posting of instructional and cancer detecting self-breast exam videos. One creative agency found a tongue-in-cheek way to circumvent this policy by using “man boobs” to not only demonstrate the proper way to administer a self-breast exam but to make the point that the policy’s allowance of male nipples and not female nipples is sexist.

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